, haunts the mind of
Biron (in Act IV, sc. iii)--

"Sow'd cockle reap'd no corn:
And justice always whirls in equal measure:
Light wenches may prove plagues to men forsworn."

In the _Two Gentlemen of Verona_, this idea, the idea that treachery
caused by some obsession is at the root of most tragedy, was treated by
him at length, perhaps for the first time.

That it haunted him then, and remained all through his life as the
pole-star of dramatic action is evident to all who read his works as
poetry should be read. It is the law of his imagination.

Passion, not weakness of will, but strength of will blinded, is the
commonest cause of treachery among us. The great poets have agreed that
anything that distorts the mental vision, anything thought of too much,
is a danger to us. Passion that with the glimmer of a new drunkenness
blinds the mature to the life and death memories of marriage, and kills
in the immature the memory of love, friendship, and past benefits, is a
form of destruction. In its action as a destroyer, it is the subject of
Shakespeare's greatest plays. In the _Two Gentlemen of Verona_ he is
interested less in the destruction than in the moral blindness that
leads to it.

Shakespeare's method is simple. He shows us two charming young men
becoming morally blind with passion, in a company not so blinded. The
only other "inconstant" person in the play (Sir Thurio) is inconstant
from that water-like quality in the mind that floods with the full moon,
and ebbs like a neap soon after. Even the members of the sub-plot, the
two servants, are constant, the one to his master, who beats him, the
other to the dog that gets him beaten. A lesser mind would sit in
judgment in such a play. The task of genius is not to sit in judgment.

"Our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together."

Shakespeare neither praises nor blames. His task is to see justly. It is
we who conclude that treachery looks ugly beside its opposite.

Of the fine scenes in the play, sc. iv in Act II, where Valentine and
Sir Thurio walk with Silvia, with whom they are both in love, is the
liveliest. The two men bicker across the lady, as though the next word
would bring blows. The demure pleasure of Silvia in being quarrelled
for, is indicated most masterly in less than thirty words. Act III, sc.
i, where the Duke discovers Valentine's plot to escape with Silvia, is a
passage of noble dramatic power, doubly inter